Virgin 747 biofuel demo flight next month

BendiBus

It will likely be a blend of biofuel & Jet A1

http://www.rte.ie/business/2008/0114/virgin.html

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BendiBus wrote: »

It will likely be a blend of biofuel & Jet A1

http://www.rte.ie/business/2008/0114/virgin.html

Smells like greenwashing. Branson never misses an opportunity to get free publicity. I'll be surprised if anything useful in the long term materialises from this flight.

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Capt'n Midnight

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2006/sep/22/travelnews.frontpagenews

Sir Richard Branson joined the growing ranks of global warming activists yesterday by committing $3bn (£1.6bn) to tackle climate change. The billionaire pledged all profits from his Virgin air and rail interests over the next 10 years to combating rising global temperatures. However, the estimated $3bn will not go to charities and will be invested in a new branch of Sir Richard's ever-expanding Virgin conglomerate, Virgin Fuels. Much of the investment will focus on biofuels, an alternative to oil-based fuels made from plants.

The government has ordered petrol stations in the UK to source 5% of their fuel from renewable energy by 2010, one of several lucrative opportunities for biofuel producers such as Virgin.

irishsurfer

I did an interview on www.worldsurfradio.com about this, show 19.
The USAF ran a B-52 exclusively on synthetic fuel with no real problems.

Essentially one can create synthetic jet fuel from gas using the Fischer-Thropp process developed in Germany.
This was further developed in South Africa. SASOIL still do this, and sponsor the Springboks.

In another interview in Show 25 I spoke with a brilliant guy called Ainea Kimaro from Tanzania who has done great work with biogas.

I really think the two systems could work well together, particularly with the price of oil these days.

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Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2006/sep/22/travelnews.frontpagenews

Branson obviously sees biofuels as a good market, and this 747 flight from London to Amsterdam would appear to me to be a publicity stunt to plug Virgin Fuels. If Branson was seriously green, I suspect that he would be investing in other technologies.

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Capt'n Midnight

irishsurfer wrote: »

I really think the two systems could work well together, particularly with the price of oil these days.

http://www.petrolprices.com/ fuel in the UK is about £1 per litre ( 99p - 114.9 )

http://www.eppo.go.th/ref/UNIT-OIL.html 1 American barrel = 158.984 liters so it which works out at £158 per barrel

The UK economy works with fuel costs of over $300 per Barrel

This means similar economies would work too, and many alternative fuels / energy streams could be found for less that this $300 figure even now.

BendiBus

This flight is due to take off this morning.

According to BBC News 24, it's fuelled by coconut oil from the rain forest

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7261214.stm

Capt'n Midnight

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/7261214.stm - updated

The biofuel was derived from a mixture of babassu nuts and coconuts.

The company said the babassu tree, native to Brazil, and the coconuts did not compete with staple food sources and came from existing mature plantations.

...

Greenpeace's chief scientist, Dr Doug Parr, labelled the flight a "high-altitude greenwash" and said less air travel was the only answer.

"Instead of looking for a magic green bullet, Virgin should focus on the real solution to this problem and call for a halt to relentless airport expansion."

But Virgin Atlantic president Sir Richard Branson said the flight was an early step towards greener aviation.

"This pioneering flight will enable those of us who are serious about reducing our carbon emissions to go on developing the fuels of the future, fuels which will power our aircraft in the years ahead through sustainable next-generation oils, such as algae."

Only one engine of the four used the fuel so very early days yet.
Asking Virgin to reduce the number of flights :rolleyes: